Former administrative law judge Roy Pearson Jr. just can’t catch a break in his quest to hold someone accountable for losing his job with the District of Columbia.

Pearson, recall, was the judge who filed a multimillion-dollar suit against a dry cleaner over a lost pair of pants. The suit didn’t go unnoticed. In 2007, Pearson was denied reappointment to his post as a D.C. administrative law judge. Pearson sued, making a host of claims.

The D.C. Circuit rejected flat-out Pearson’s claim in briefs that U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle, the trial judge who dismissed the federal suit, should have been recused because of her association with several of the defendants, who include D.C. Superior Court judges who had varying degrees of involvement in the decision to deny Pearson reappointment.

The appeals court said a person who is fully apprised of the circumstances “could not reasonably question that judge’s impartiality.”

This is what Huvelle had to say about Pearson’s pants suit when she dismissed it: “A review of the nature of, and motivation behind, plaintiff’s lawsuit demonstrates that plaintiff was not on a mission to protect the public welfare.”